School board to continue search for superintendent

BOGOTA — The office of the executive county superintendent notified the Board of Education on Feb. 9 that a contract submitted for the candidate selected as the frontrunner in the school district’s superintendent search was not approved, BOE President Charles Severino said. The contract included a salary of $160,000, $15,000 above recent state pay cap regulations for superintendents in a school district of Bogota’s size. The candidate originally selected by the BOE is no longer pursuing the position, Severino said.

"We’ve basically received notice that it’s not approvable in its current format," Interim Superintendent Dr. Harry Groveman said of the contract. "We’ll have to resubmit it with a salary that does not exceed the cap for a district of our size."

Under state regulations, which went into effect Feb. 7, superintendent salaries are capped based on total student enrollment in each district. Per the regulations, Bogota’s next superintendent will receive a salary capped at $145,000, as the district falls in the 751 to 1,500 student enrollment range. Superintendents of the smallest districts with 0 to 250 students will receive a salary capped at $125,000, while superintendents of the largest districts with 6,501 to 10,000 students will make $175,000.

The candidate initially selected by the BOE is a tenured high school principal who will earn approximately $155,000 in July, Severino said. In Bogota, the candidate would face a $10,000 salary cut with the caps, he said.

The BOE submitted the contract to the executive county superintendent’s office in early January, but the county superintendent’s office waited until after pay cap regulations went into effect to review it, Groveman said.

"We put a tremendous amount of time and effort into this, and state sandbagged us at the eleventh-hour," Severino said, adding the governor and acting commissioner of the Department of Education had been "intransigent" on superintendent compensation.

Robert Gilmartin, executive county superintendent of Bergen and Passaic counties, said his office followed "directives from the acting commissioner of the state Department of Education to hold any contracts submitted after Nov. 15."

"I returned the contract they submitted with notification that there were some changes that needed to be made for approval," Gilmartin said of Bogota’s contract.

Gilmartin declined to discuss particulars of the contract, saying only that he hopes it can be approved upon resubmission.

The BOE has not made a decision as to whether it may look into possible legal action against the state, Severino said.

Groveman said as of Feb. 10, the BOE’s search for a candidate is ongoing.

"I think that the Board is going to revisit its candidate pool," Groveman said. "They will make decisions about candidates within the pool before they have to redo their search."

If the BOE selects a candidate from the existing pool, a decision will likely be finalized by the middle to end of March, Groveman said.